Brief introduction - I am a ESL tutor from South Korea.

Standout ideas from this week's lectures and reading material:
(too many thought-provoking and interesting points this week!)

- 2.2 The Profession of Education / 2.4 8th Dimension of NL - the role of the teacher
I can relate to this lecture, as I was not trained formally nor licensed as a teacher, but found myself in the education industry. Anyone can be an educator, anyone with any form of skills or knowledge to impart! Anyone can be seen as a mentor, a senior. I may not be formally trained, but I enjoy teaching young students and feel I do have so much to learn from them as I teach them! Let's embrace the non-public servant, formal school teachers in other industries.

- 2.4 2nd Dimension of NL - Institutional Locations of Learning
Learning can take place ANYWHERE and anytime. This has been facilitated with mobile technology. When I find myself needing some kind of information, I turn to the web or some application on my smartphone for learning (informal learning). Most of the skills I need in my life were actually acquired through informal learning, than formal learning.

- 2.4 6th Dimension of NL - Learner Differences
I like this point, but find it hard to actualize this. Every learner IS different, but how do we conduct a lesson with 10 different styles for 15 students? I'm still trying to figure this out. Of course, the one size fits all approach doesn't work as well anymore, so I'm trying to give flexibility to students. For eg, I'd try to give more room for creativity by saying things like "Okay, do it whatever way you want. Let's see how it works out".

- Relevant Reading Material
#4 The one that was the most relevant to my personal experiences was this one by Kalantzis and Cope - Working with Disruptive Change
I don't favor the word "disruptive"! But that's exactly how it is - changes are disrupting traditional, mass education institutions. Let's call the change "transformative" and "reflective". I like the points mentioned here and was thinking about how to apply them in my teaching. Especially the point about horizontal communication, lateral learning, letting the students self-manage, give one another peer-to-peer reviews etc. I always strive to move myself away from the centre of the classroom, to give students more voice and opportunity to lead the discussions, do a project in whatever way they think is best etc.

Lastly, the point about "ways of assessing" - this is tricky. In this day and age, I'm sad to admit that assessment based on short-term memory is still prevalent. But it's time-consuming and not assuring (for us educators) to actualize, is it? - conducting formative assessment. I'm really reflecting on this point.